Enhancing individual plants’ sugar signalling ability could deliver increased wheat yields of up to 12%.
This is according to a joint study from Rothamsted, Oxford University, and the Rosalind Franklin Institute.
This enhanced potential is an order of magnitude greater than annual yield increases currently being achieved through breeding.
The effect was achieved by applying a synthetic ‘pre-signalling molecule’ that releases trehalose-6-phosphate (T6P) in the plants, a signalling molecule that controls the plant equivalent of ‘blood sugar’.
The chemical is a major regulator of metabolism, growth, and development, including activating the pathway for the synthesis of starch, the world’s most significant food carbohydrate.
The link was discovered during research started at Rothamsted in 2006.
Now a four-year-long field study using plots at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT) in Mexico and the National Agricultural Technology Institute (INTA) in Argentina has confirmed that the new technology could deliver major yield improvements.
Wheat yields
Wheat has complex genetics and targeting genetic bottlenecks in germplasm makes improvement through breeding far from straightforward.
Instead, this chemical method for releasing T6P in response to sunlight acts as a direct switch for driving starch biosynthesis in grain, which forms the basis of wheat yields.
This in turn this stimulates photosynthesis in the flag leaf, due to greater demand for carbon building blocks for grain filling.
In essence, this work provides an excellent example of where direct selective manipulation of key molecular structures, rather than genetics or gene editing, is a gamechanger.
The study also suggests that it may now even be possible to reduce fertiliser applications in the search for higher yields.
This treatment with a pre-signalling molecule of T6P also activates genes for amino acid and protein synthesis in grain as well as the pathway for starch synthesis.
Sustainable agriculture
Currently, new higher yielding wheat varieties suffer from dilution of protein content, requiring increased fertiliser to maintain quality for bread-making.
However, by solving this problem and unlocking farmers’ dependence on fertiliser, the T6P treatment set a new path to more sustainable agriculture.
This would be through a system that reduces the associated greenhouse gas emissions caused by fertiliser production.
Rothamsted and Oxford have created SugaROx, a spinout company, to deliver the T6P-related research to farmers.
Dr. Cara Griffiths, CEO of SugaROx, said: “It’s exciting to be able to take cutting-edge technology from the bench to the field.
“Getting this kind of impact is often difficult to translate to the field, and this work demonstrated that novel crop inputs have huge promise to enhance yield and resilience in our cropping systems, something that is particularly important in a rapidly changing climate.”
Source: Agriland